Can Vince McMahon be hypocritical at times?

[CM Steel]

Alot of people and the IWC call WWE chairman Vince McMahon a wrestling genius. A true mastermind of sports entertainment. But as seen can be hypocritical at times. For example. Like two years ago leading into the Money in the Bank pay per-view in where number one contender at the time CM Punk was at the end of his contract in the WWE and threaten to leave with the WWE championship after he won it from then-WWE champion John Cena, and take it to wherever wrestling promotion he choose to sign with. But of course Punk re-signed with the WWE as the new WWE champion.

Vince McMahon's ego would have been crushed if CM Punk went to another wrestling company with his WWE championship belt in hand. But what about 20 years earlier when McMahon signed the current WCW champion "the Nature Boy" Ric Flair to his promotion? And Ric Flair brought the WCW world title with him claiming to be the "Real Worlds Champion"! The Nature Boy had put a $25,000 deposit on the WCW championship belt but he never got the money back from the WCW front office. So Vince McMahon had both wrestlings top titles in his wrestling promotion. But after a few weeks WCW bought back the world title from Ric Flair. So does Vince McMahon feel that he's an exception? Or on top of that. Can Vince McMahon be hypocritical at times?

 

[faltemer]

I don't for a second believe that they didn't have a contract with punk before the match, frankly I don't even buy into the story that they signed it the day of. McMahon would never risk letting a belt go to another brand again.

 

[Lord_Frish]

Well the first one is a pre-planed storyline. There was never any threat of the WWE title showing up at a different promotion, which means there isn't really a chance for Vince to actually be crushed by that happening. The second one was an actual event that took place and Vince took advantage of it. Even if Flair didn't have the title his run would have been similar. Flair would have been in the main event. I think it is more that Vince took advantage of the situation. There is very little difference between that and Lex Luger showing up for the first Nitro. They were two competing companies that were trying to one up each other. If anything it was WCWs fault for not getting the title off Flair before he went to WWE. It is similar to Jeff Jarrett's rumoured hold up of the Intercontinental Title during the Attitude Era.

But yes, Vince can be a hypocrite. Everyone is at some point.

 

[Mustang Sally]

But of course Punk re-signed with the WWE as the new WWE champion.

Yes, and while I believe there was uncertainty as to what Phil Brooks was going to do about re-signing with WWE, the questions were all answered and the contract signed before putting the championship belt around his waist.

(And through it all, I still wonder what Punk would have done with himself if he left WWE, as threatened. If he thinks he would have been any happier in TNA or any other promotion, he might have been in for a surprise).

Still, the question is whether Vince McMahon can be a hypocrite.....and the answer is yes. He's proven over the years that he'll do whatever he thinks is best for his business.....and as he's gotten older and more set in his ways, he's been wrong more than he used to. Some of those instances will feature hypocrisy as the entertainment world changes, while Vince doesn't.

Still, his willingness to deal with performers who have betrayed him (real or imagined) amazes me. That he could strike deals with guys like Bret Hart and Eric Bischoff (as a performer) show that McMahon possesses more flexibility than most people......read: he might hate what he's doing, but he'll find a way to get it done if it benefits his business.

That's hypocrisy, yes.....but sometimes his hypocrisy is a good thing.

 

[salopstick]

Flair was getting screwed by wcw so posted the belt to Vince , it was legally flair's property as they didn't pay his deposit so flair and wwf were pretty much free to with it as they pleased.

Wcw screamed copywrite so Vince digitised a wwf tag belt.

Nothing was done behind wcw's back

Unlike madusa and lex negotiating with wcw to show up as their contracts ended

 

[Rayne]

....you really bought that whole bit about CM Punk leaving the company with the championship???

There was this thing that happened in 2000. There was this company based out of Philadelphia, called ECW, and while they had been playing a really hot hand in the mid-'90s, years of talent raids had taken their toll on the company (hi, ROH!) ECW was no longer drawing the audiences it needed to, and was unable to pay a lot of their performers (hi, TNA!) They had only one real "star" available at the time, due to injuries or the whole 'no money' thing, and his name was Mike Awesome.

Mike Awesome is like today's Kevin Steen. He was the last (uninjured, hi RVD) cult hero for a promotion which had seen much better days before, but had more value for its reputation than its actual status. As the last cult hero left, Heyman turned him into an indestructible world champion who ran roughshod over ECW, putting the promotion on his back, but also not paying him.

Then this promotion that existed a long time ago called WCW, that had a reputation for flinging around money wildly, offered Mike Awesome an absurd sum of money compared to his value to come to their promotion, and it was only last minute legal wrangling- the boring kind about property rights, not the fun kind where someone makes a match out of it- which kept the ECW title from being shown on WCW television. ECW ended up getting their revenge by... appearing on WWF television and having Hunter pin their champion.

The lesson learned here is that you never, ever, ever place employees in positions of major responsibility when you aren't paying them. Because someone else might. AJ Styles isn't "under short term contract"- either he's locked up tight, or they're arguing over mundane shit like his per diem for travel expenses. CM Punk wasn't off contract; where else was he going to go? (People noticed TNA's money issues before 2011, when their plan turned from controlled growth to "let's flip a coin and hope this works". Costs of live television are part of a whole story.)

This is 2013. Even promoters down at the ROH and CZW level understand the idea of binding employees before you use them.

 

[CM Steel]

Okay let's try this another way then. The infamous Montreal screwjob! The main reason why Vince McMahon screwed Bret Hart out of the WWF/E championship is because Bret was leaving the WWF/E to go to WCW. And Vince didn't want Bret leaving the company with his world title. But of course Bret Hart wouldn't have showed up in WCW on Nitro with the WWF/e championship. He was too big of a man for that. But Vince McMahon pulled the trigger on Bret Hart with the screwjob thus Bret Hart being screwed out the WWF/E title the way he was.

Yeah the thing with CM Punk and the WWE championship was part of a storyline. But it was more recent then the infamous Montreal screwjob.

 

[#tamale]

By talking about the Montreal Screwjob, you're just opening up a topic that people are split on.

Has Vince made bad decisions in the past? Yes. Will he continue to in the future? Yes. Can he be viewed as a hypocrite? Of course. That's part of life. Each and every one of us makes bad decisions, whether they be personal or professional. Mustang Sally said it best, he has had personal feuds that go way back. However, he also does what he feels will be good business. That's what it all comes down to. Money. If you and Vince can make some money, personal feelings aside won't matter.

I think a better topic would be why do some people have an obsession with constantly portraying Vince in a negative light.

 

[MrMojoRisin]

Alot of people and the IWC call WWE chairman Vince McMahon a wrestling genius. A true mastermind of sports entertainment. But as seen can be hypocritical at times. For example. Like two years ago leading into the Money in the Bank pay per-view in where number one contender at the time CM Punk was at the end of his contract in the WWE and threaten to leave with the WWE championship after he won it from then-WWE champion John Cena, and take it to wherever wrestling promotion he choose to sign with. But of course Punk re-signed with the WWE as the new WWE champion.

Vince McMahon's ego would have been crushed if CM Punk went to another wrestling company with his WWE championship belt in hand. But what about 20 years earlier when McMahon signed the current WCW champion "the Nature Boy" Ric Flair to his promotion? And Ric Flair brought the WCW world title with him claiming to be the "Real Worlds Champion"! The Nature Boy had put a $25,000 deposit on the WCW championship belt but he never got the money back from the WCW front office. So Vince McMahon had both wrestlings top titles in his wrestling promotion. But after a few weeks WCW bought back the world title from Ric Flair. So does Vince McMahon feel that he's an exception? Or on top of that. Can Vince McMahon be hypocritical at times?

A) Vince is a genius. No one else was able to do what he did (and some of the other promoters back when Junior started expanding absolutely had the same idea in mind). He's made mistakes, he makes mistakes, and he'll continue to make mistakes. Everyone does. That doesn't change what he's done, and what he's accomplished.

B) The Punk thing was 100% storyline. There was never any danger of Punk leaving the company with the title... because he was already under contract before that entire angle even started. They obviously did an amazing job kayfabing the Internet, but the simple fact remains... they never would have let Punk come close to the championship if they didn't have him taken care of already.

C) I don't understand how Vince is a hypocrite because he didn't want Punk leaving with the title, just because he brought Flair in with the physical NWA belt a couple decades earlier. So just because he took advantage of that situation with Flair in the 90's, he should just sit back and not care 20 years later when the shoe is on the other foot? I'm not saying Vince isn't a hypocrite (he is, but at the same time, so are most people to various degrees)... but this isn't an example of hypocrisy at all.

D) I know it was in another post, but Montreal Screwjob isn't really a comparable here. That was a real situation. Punk's situation wasn't.

 

[Dysturbed]

People tend to say and do what they truly feel and believe at the time. Sometimes new circumstances, thinking about things, etc eventually alter their stance.Aside from that, things in life tend to be situational, meaning that the differences that each situation involve speak volumes about why things happen in different ways, even though similarities between situations exist. Posters have given examples of that. Maybe that makes people, in this case Vince hypocrites, but it also makes them human.

 

[IT Factor]

The quite simple answer here is yes. Two words; Anti-bullying. The whole "Be A Star" is a public relations project intended to stop all forms of bullying, yet, McMahon himself is quite well known for being a bully. One need not look any further than his mocking of Jim Ross multiple times throughout many years to see visual and audio proof. If you read different wrestler's autobiographies, you'll read that most of them have had numerous disagreements and subsequent punishments based on that. Which is what? Bullying. And that is just the ones who aren't signed by WWE who have pointed it out. Not including the numerous stories that contracted talents could tell, if allowed to do so.